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Successor to Vioxx fails to quell concerns

When drug company Merck revealed the the results of a study this week over it's successor to Vioxx, the new arthritis drug Arcoxia, it did little to quell concerns about both the use and the safety of the new drug.

15 Nov 2006

Botox could fix your knees as well as your wrinkles

The preliminary results of a new study have found that Botox, better known for getting rid of wrinkles, significantly reduced severe pain from osteoarthritis of the knee and also improved the knee's function.

15 Nov 2006

Painkiller in saliva stronger than morphine

A team of French researchers say they have found that the human body produces a natural painkiller several times more potent than morphine.

15 Nov 2006

Stem cell therapy promises hope for muscular dystrophy victims

Italian scientists, by using new stem cell therapy on dogs with muscular dystrophy, have improved the dogs condition to such an extent that the dogs were able to walk and even jump again.

15 Nov 2006

Migrants account for bulk of TB, HIV and malaria cases in the UK

According to a report by the Health Protection Agency (HPA) in Britain, migrants are far more likely to have HIV, TB or malaria than the rest of the population.

15 Nov 2006

Investigational drug tolvaptan treats hyponatremia

Results of the two largest studies on hyponatremia, SALT-1 and SALT-2, presented Nov. 14 at the American Heart Association's Scientific Sessions in Chicago, found that the investigational drug tolvaptan treated hyponatremia -- water intoxication -- faster and more effectively than available treatments.

14 Nov 2006

Virtual reality helps amputees

Academics from the University of Manchester School of Computer Science and School of Psychological Sciences have developed a virtual reality system, which gives the illusion that a person's amputated limb is still there.

From The University of Manchester 14 Nov 2006

MChip to detect H5N1

Scientists from the University of Colorado at Boulder and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have developed an inexpensive "gene chip" test based on a single influenza virus gene that could allow scientists to quickly identify flu viruses, including avian influenza H5N1.

14 Nov 2006

More banks offer health savings accounts, additional benefits

The number of banks that offer health savings accounts has more than tripled since the end of 2005, as more employees enroll in high-deductible health plans that qualify for HSAs, the Wall Street Journal reports.

14 Nov 2006

Oklahoma Health Board approves parental consent for abortion form; enforcement procedures unclear

It is unclear how a consent form approved last week by the Oklahoma State Board of Health for the state's law requiring parental consent for minors seeking abortion will be enforced and which agency will enforce it, the Tulsa World reports.

14 Nov 2006

China's one-child-per-family policy has prevented 400 million births

The one-child policy seeks to keep China's population, now 1.3 billion, at around 1.7 billion by 2050. Ethnic minorities and farmers are the only groups legally exempt from the rule.

14 Nov 2006

40% of U.S. women ages 18 to 75 know about human papillomavirus

Forty percent of U.S. women ages 18 to 75 have heard about human papillomavirus and of those women, 20% are aware that it can cause cervical cancer, according to the National Cancer Institute's 2005 Health Information National Trends Survey, which was presented on Sunday at the American Association for Cancer Research's Frontiers in Cancer Prevention Research Meeting in Boston, Reuters Health reports.

14 Nov 2006

HIV prevention campaign promoting condom use among Chilean youth sparks debate among politicians, Catholic church

A new government-sponsored campaign in Chile promoting condom use among youth in an effort to reduce the spread of HIV in the country has "provoked the ire" of the Roman Catholic Church and some conservative political parties, the Miami Herald reports.

14 Nov 2006

MSF, Oxfam call on wealthy nations to adhere to WTO guidelines to ensure drug access in developing countries

Medecins Sans Frontieres and Oxfam on Tuesday called on developed nations to adhere to the World Trade Organization's Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights to ensure universal access to antiretroviral drugs in developing countries, the AP/International Herald Tribune reports (Higgins, AP/International Herald Tribune, 11/14).

14 Nov 2006

U.S. voters in midterm elections spoke out 'resoundingly' about abortion, privacy

The outcome of the U.S. midterm elections "spoke so unambiguously about abortion that even the most intransigent antiabortionists should be able to construe the message: Voters do not want Big Brother opening the doors of private homes -- or the doctor's office -- and coercing people's most personal medical decisions," a Los Angeles Times editorial says.

14 Nov 2006

Testosterone replacement therapy appears to be safe - has little effect on the prostate gland

Preliminary research suggests that testosterone replacement therapy for men with low testosterone levels appears to have little effect on the prostate gland, contrary to some reports that this therapy may be harmful, according to a study in the November 15 issue of JAMA: The Journal of the American Medical Association.

14 Nov 2006

Novel way of tackling diseases related to the immune system

A new study has suggested a novel way of combating diseases related to the immune system, including cancer and autoimmune diseases such as type I diabetes and arthritis. The study, funded by the Wellcome Trust, appears online in the journal Nature.

14 Nov 2006

Lifestyle decisions that may stave off onset of cancer

Personal choices, such as smoking and consumption of fatty foods, have long been linked to increased cancer risk. During recent years, scientists have been seeking to isolate a variety of lifestyle decisions that may stave off the onset of cancer or even reduce tumor formation in their early stages.

14 Nov 2006

Gender differences in heart failure

Women tend to live longer with heart failure than do men, and they also tend to have a less severe form of the disease, which is characterized by reduced performance of the heart muscle, according to a study by Duke University Medical Center cardiologists.

14 Nov 2006

Proteins may behave differently in natural environments

When in an environment similar to that in which they exist naturally, proteins and multiprotein assemblies may demonstrate actions or dynamics different than those they exhibit when in the static form in which they are most often studied, said researchers at Baylor College of Medicine in a report in the current issue of the journal Structure.

14 Nov 2006